High Performance Mindset | Learn from World-Class Leaders, Consultants, Athletes & Coaches about Mindset - 223: Do it For You

Episode Date: December 18, 2018

 “When you don’t feel like you’re competing with others, you compete only with yourself. You do it for you. And you do more, go further, and perform better.” Neil Pasricha – The Happiness Advantage   High Performers do it for themselves. They choose goals for intrinsic reason, not extrinsic like money, fame, or promotion. When you do it for you, you go further, and perform better.   Power Phrase:  “I do it for me. I go after my goals for my reasons.”

Welcome to High Performance Mindset with Dr. Sindra Kampoff. Do you want to reach your full potential, live a life of passion, go after your dreams? Each week we bring you strategies and interviews to help you ignite your mindset. Let's bring on Sindra. High Performance Mindset on the Country Club today with Dr. Sindra Kampoff. Good morning, Sindra. Good morning. It's great to be here. Awesome to have you in today. The smile's always so much bigger on your face after a Vikings win when you roll in here on Monday. This is true. It's true for all of us, right?

All of us that are fans. That was a nice, much, much needed win. So, in the wild card chase. Today's topic is a good one. I have been, I walked in here today and actually I looked at a co-worker and said, Oh my gosh, my diet has been awful lately. Get all of the holiday junk food away from me. Yeah.

And I thought, man, I just have to be better about what I'm doing diet-wise this time of year. And it's really not for anybody but myself just because I know that I don't feel as good when I eat all this junk. So today's topic is do it for you. And we like to start with a quote. This is a quote from Neil Pasricha. He wrote The Happiness Advantage. He said this, when you don't feel like you're competing with others, you compete only with yourself. You do it for you and you do it more, you go further and perform better. That's pretty nice. Okay. So you have a story to start with today. Explain.

Yeah, I was thinking about a story that I could use for myself. And when I first started the podcast, High Performance Mindset, I was constantly looking at the downloaded numbers. So the numbers of people who downloaded each podcast. And I would look at them and analyze them and look at, you know, the downloads for the week and for the month. And I started to see my motivation decrease. And I started to see that, like, it made me anxious. And I really wasn't that excited to record a podcast episode because I kept on thinking about, well, how many downloads

are we going to have here? And I realized that I had this external goal, like numbers of downloads instead of really doing it for myself or for others and to make an impact for people who are listening. And so I stopped looking at the numbers. Now I do it, I don't know, I can't remember the last time I looked at the downloads because instead I'm thinking about the impact that it makes. And I'm wondering if people have a similar example from their lives where maybe they had an external goal and you could see that your motivation really lacked and maybe increased some anxiety or pressure in your life. Instead of what I realized is that these internal goals keep me going, that these internal goals are really what keeps me motivated and excited and, you know, working to make an impact.

So I guess there's some research probably to discuss about what, about setting internal goals. What do you have there? So, you know, there are really two types of motivation, intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation. Intrinsic motivation is really internal. You're doing it for yourself because you want to. And extrinsic is external. You're doing it because you want to get something from it. You know, maybe recognition, fame, money, raise a better job, something like that. And which do you think leads to better performance?

Well, I guess if I had to guess, I'd say the internal, the intrinsic. Is that what you called it? Yep. Yep. Exactly. And it actually leads to more happiness, too. So not only are what we're talking about today helps you perform better and stick with your goals, but leads to being happier as well. What are some of the bigger problems we bump into with setting those external goals then instead, like saying, I want to make a bunch of money. Exactly. Well, so you do it for others or external reasons, not yourself. And I think the interesting thing about external goals is there, there's sometimes things that we can't control. Like you can't fully control winning a national championship

or winning in general, or you can't control if you really get a raise or a promotion because someone else has to approve you or promote you. And I think it's also really hard to compete endlessly with something else, right? If you have an external goal or if you're comparing yourself to someone else, you're, you know, there's this always changing. And unless you're like the best in the world, you know, there's always someone to compare yourself to. And I was thinking about the best in the world means that you're one in seven billion, right? Right. Yeah. Yeah.

Doing that one thing. Exactly. Exactly. I think about, you know, I was trying to think of like certain external, like everyday life type things. Maybe you got a bridezilla who wants everybody to look at a certain way and you're trying to, you know, lose that weight for that reason. It's not really your goal.

Yeah, for your reason, for yourself. Maybe you're a sports athlete, a kid, and you play the sport, but you really play it more because your parents, maybe, I think that happens more than we think. That kids are playing because, and hoping to impress their parents, maybe, instead of doing it for themselves.

Yeah, or maybe like what you said earlier about losing weight and you're, you know, you're doing it more for yourself and because you know that it makes you feel good. Right. Right. So get your cookies away from me because I don't have a lot of willpower. Good thing I didn't bring any today. So what does the research say about internal goals and internal motivation? These are things that will drive us, right?

That are motivating us inside. Yeah. So studies show that when we value the rewards we get from doing something, we actually lose our interest in doing it. Okay. So let me give you an example. So one study divided writers up into three groups and one group was given an external reason or extrinsic reason to write, like making money or impressing their teachers or getting into grad school. Others were given a list of intrinsic reasons to write, like enjoying the feeling of writing or expressing yourself. And the third group wasn't given any reason at all. And what they found is like the worst quality, the lowest quality of writing actually came from the people who had extrinsic reasons to keep doing it. So extrinsic reasons can lead to us, you know, our goal can be hard to sustain. So and that's that sort of competing with others or for somebody instead

of for yourself kind of thing. So competing with others can kind of do that same thing. What do you mean by that? Yeah. So here's another example of a study. So they asked students to solve a puzzle and some were told that they were competing with others and some were told they weren't. And the students who were told that they were competing with others actually simply stopped working when the other people finished. And then the kids that, you know, kept going were weren't told that they were competing with others. So, you know, when you don't feel like you're competing with other people, you're really competing for yourself. And that's what we're talking about today is doing it for you. How does the puzzle thing then, how does that

relate to us? So I think about how sometimes, and my boys, I can see this sometimes when they're so focused on competing with other people or competing with each other, you know, that they don't sustain their motivation long-term, that they just, they give up, right? Because it is, winning is something that we can't control. And to think about, and i think we're all probably guilty of that external thing once in a while but to think about not really doing it for ourselves is kind of silly you're like why wouldn't you do this for yourself why wouldn't you do something you want to pursue that makes you happy what gets in our way from having us do things for ourselves? I think when we listen to others, when we try to compete with others, sometimes we listen to the critics and we take other people's opinions over our opinion of

ourselves. And we listen to outside numbers or rankings instead of what we really want. And it's usually, I think, because we judge ourselves. Sometimes we lack self-confidence and we can get confused on should we listen to ourselves or should we listen to other people? So we can really get lost in our own head. We live in a pretty judgmental society too, where cowardly people can do it anonymously on social media and things like that. And that's kind of tough because sometimes it's just a little worm that gets stuck in your brain and you start to doubt yourself. Absolutely. What do you suggest we do? So I'd suggest you at the end of the year, be thinking about what goals that you'd like to go after for next year. And I'd encourage you to write your goals down. But between now and, you know, maybe January 1st,

consider why you're going after these goals and what's motivating you to going after them. Are you doing it for some external reason or something that you really want? And if it's something that you really want, you're more likely to stick with it. You'll perform better and you'll be happier because you're doing it for yourself. And you say to be confident about those goals too, right? What does confidence have to do with that? So, you know, confidence really means like your belief in your ability and your certainty that you'll be successful. And I think sometimes confidence, people think that's something that we have, you know, we get it, but I think it's really a skill. It's a decision. And so think while

you're thinking about those goals and what do you really want, like turn off that judgmental thinking and think about what do you really want for yourself? Because if you are more confident, you're more likely to go after those goals that make you happy. I think that was pretty powerful. Just saying confidence is a decision is pretty powerful right there when you think about that. Great way to step out the door on a Monday and make that decision. How do you summarize today's topic? It's pretty good. Yeah. So I'd say high performers, those people who are working to reach their greater potential, they do it for themselves and they choose goals for intrinsic reasons, not extrinsic reasons like money or fame or promotion. But when you do

it for you, you go further, you perform better. All right. Not to say that money and fame and a promotion might not come along, but at least you're doing it for yourself, right? And then you get the best of both worlds. What's the power phrase for today? So I do it for me. I go after my goals for my reasons. Awesome. If we want to get in touch with you or get the podcasts or order up the book, any of those things, I know a lot of people using the Syndra Camp Off info with coworkers, employees, sports teams, families, all of that. How do we get in touch with you? You can head over to Dr. Syndra, so D-R-C-I-N-D-R-A dot com. And Monday, I just launched a video series, actually, like a video online course.

It's really popular. The last couple of weeks, people registering for that. And then they get a book and a workbook with that, and an online e-book and an audio book. So a lot of different things you can get with that. Thank you for listening to High Performance Mindset. If you liked today's podcast, make a comment, share it with a friend, and join the conversation on Twitter at Mentally Underscore Strong. For more inspiration and to receive Sindra's free weekly videos, check out DrSindra.com.